Is it a Bad Idea to Buy a Cheap NSX?
When you buy the least expensive clean-title NSX in the Country, how bad could it be?
Sometimes when you see a really good deal on an amazing car like the first generation flip-up-headlight NSX, it’s too good to be true. Other times, however, you’re forced to just say “to heck with it”, bite the bullet, and buy the sucker. In this case, Hoovie of AutoTrader did the latter. He found this red 1992 car for just thirty-one grand. When it was delivered, he found a horrendously trimmed interior, shoddy ABS, a wonky alignment, and a completely useless HVAC unit. Needless to say, it was an inexpensive car for a reason. It needed a ton of work.
Starting with the easy stuff, he got the car a proper alignment. That fixed the handling issues, and an ABS delete kit (a popular modification for NSX owners) got rid of the braking issues. Those two things fixed and it’s back to handling and stopping like an NSX should. Some preventative maintenance was in order, as a car without records should always be assumed to need pretty much everything. A belt service, oil change, valve cover gaskets, and spark plugs later, and the engine is in tip top. If you’re not interested in air conditioning or heat, and can deal with a horrid interior, you probably could have stopped there and had a really cheap NSX.
[Want to know more about the NSX? Check out the Honda-tech NSX sub-forum.]
Hoovie went that extra step and had the interior recovered and retrimmed with some bits from higher spec NSXs and some aftermarket carbon fiber. It doesn’t look stock, but it also doesn’t look bad. The HVAC unit was sent out for a rebuild and now that works, too. It’s all coming together nicely. With a set of refinished wheels and new tires, the car is basically back to fresh condition.
Having never watched any of his videos before, we have to say that this Hoovie guy is pretty entertaining, but he yells too much. And we were completely blown away by his absurd pronunciation of Zanardi. However bad that was, though, Hoovie did get a pretty great car for not really that much money. It’s well sorted, and it looks pretty great with those later style wheels. Throwing ten grand at a 31,000 dollar NSX is not a bad idea when, all told, it turns out like this one did. Sure, he probably could have bought one that was “done” for the same money, but then it wouldn’t be “his.” We approve.
[Source: Hoovies Garage on YouTube]